Thanksgiving 1968

When we got home from the FHC Saturday night, we had been home about ten minutes, we received a phone call from our daughter, Karen. She told me that her son-in-law, Jon had had a stroke. I said, Shani’s Jon? And she said yes. I said something about my stroke that I had had just before Thanksgiving in 1968 almost three weeks after Kim was born. She said she didn’t know I had had a stroke. Anyway, we went a little later than evening down to the hospital. I just waltzed in and told Jon, “I’ve come to give you hope.” I told him about my stroke. As we were coming home I tho’t that all of my children, altho’ Bryan was 5, Michael 4, Karen 2 ½ and Kim almost three weeks and Richard not yet born for eight more years, may not really know anything about it. So I decided to write it down.

On the Monday before Thanksgiving, November 25, 1968, I awoke with a slight head ache. Kim lacked two days of being three weeks old. Mondays were always busy. I had a 5 year old, Bryan, 4 year old Michael, 2 ½ year old Karen as well as Kim. Monday was wash day. I had a wringer type washer so once I started washing I had to stick right to it in order to finish. Monday was also bake day, baking bread, a cake and cookies for my family for the coming week. By the time I’d finished the wash, my head ache had gotten worse. I had a pain in my head with every heart beat. I called the doctor. I couldn’t get past the receptionist. She told me, “Well, you have four small children; maybe you have a migraine.” I told her I’d never had one before and tho’t and I hope I don’t have one now. I took a couple of asprin which dulled it for awhile and went on with my baking. After the asprin wore off it was much worse. I took some Darvon that my dad had given me that he had had left over from some surgery he had had. It didn’t help a bit. (I wasn’t an RN then so hadn’t heard you weren’t supposed to take medications prescribed for other people.) I called the doctor again. Again, I couldn’t get past the receptionist. I went back to taking care of my little ones and my baking. I called the doctor again and this time the receptionist called him to the phone. I described what I had been experiencing. He told me to come in that it might be my blood pressure. I told him I would have to wait until my husband got home from work. When Karl got home, (as far as I can remember, I got all the washing done and put away and the baking done. I didn’t iron until Tuesday.) we gathered up the children and he took me to the doctor’s office. He took my B/P and told me that my top number was over 200 and bottom number was over 100. (If I’d had my degree then I would have had him be more specific. Since I didn’t the numbers didn’t mean that much to me anyway.) He gave me a shot of Demerol and Phenergan and told me to go home and go to bed. Karl was there to take care of the children so I went to bed and slept. Altho’ Kim was our largest baby, ½ ounce shy of nine pounds, he woke up twice between 10 pm and 6 am to be fed. I can’t remember if I was aware of his waking up that night or if Karl had to feed him. I do remember waking up about 4:30 am to use the bathroom. I remember my right leg dragging as I walked. When I looked in the mirror, I noticed that the left side of my mouth drooped. 40 years ago women had to use a belt to hold their sanitary napkins. I was still flowing from the birth. I remember it seemed to take forever to put the clean napkin on because my right hand wasn’t working very well. Afterwards, I went back to bed and slept until the alarm went off. Karl asked me how I was feeling. I guess he could immediately tell something was wrong. He called the doctor as soon he was in his office and was told that he would see me but not until he had seen all of his other patients. 40 years ago there were no doctors in the emergency rooms altho’ they did have emergency rooms staffed with nurses. We didn’t think about going there, tho’. I remember Karl and Phil Ingersal, the Elders Quorum President, lying their hands on my head and giving me a blessing. I remember feeling like it wasn’t really me they were giving the blessing to. It was like I was observing their giving it to someone else. Karl had called the school and told them he couldn’t be there that day and explained why. If I remember right, they told him to take the next day off too. I can’t remember that much about those two days. I do remember going to the doctors office. I imagine Karl had to assist me as I walked. I can’t really remember. When I asked him if he did, he said he couldn’t but, “all I know is you were pretty brave, pretty brave.” I don’t remember that either. I suspect he was the brave one. He was a 31 year old father with a 5, 4 2 ½ , almost three week old children and a 25 year old wife who couldn’t function. I can only imagine how I would feel had the situation been reversed. They took me into the exam room. I was sitting there on the exam table. I guess the doctor could understand me and I was able to convey my concerns to him. He just looked at me, took my B/P and maybe listened to my heart and lungs, I’m not sure. I do know they didn’t have me undress or anything and he also didn’t have me walk or shake my hand or anything like that. I do remember asking him if it were a stroke. He said, “No, it was an allergy to Phenergan.” I asked him how he knew it wasn’t a stroke and he said, “Because you are not old enough to have had a stroke.” Now, keep in mind he was an OBGYN doctor and if he had ever studied strokes it was probably 40 years ago. (He was probably in his 50’s which seemed old to me at that time.) He didn’t even have the decency to go out into the waiting room where Karl was with our four children and speak with him or try to reassure him or anything. There were no other patients there. (We had just moved here to Idaho Falls the last of August and didn’t know that many people, none well, nor no any other doctors.) So Karl took me and the children back home. It seems like he took the children out to the car and then came and assisted me back. Karl tells me that when I was trying to tell him what the doctor said, that I was talking about a little red bike. (I remember his telling later truck but he now says bike.) I tho’t I was saying what the doctor had told me. It sounded to me like I was. I don’t remember the next day at all. I know I slept thro’ Kim’s nightly feedings. Didn’t hear a thing. That is a symptom of strokes is the sleeping a lot. We had been invited down to Grace to my in-laws for Thanksgiving. I remember being there. There was plenty of help for Karl with the children while we were there. I think Karl’s brothers, Gene and Stan and their families were there too. I remember sitting in a chair in the dining room and their serving me a piece of pumpkin pie with whipped cream on top. I was in an arm chair and someone had set the pie on the arm of the chair. I was using my left hand to eat because my right wasn’t working right. As I was trying to cut a piece of pie to eat it, the pie fell upside down on the carpet. I remember feeling devastated until I looked at my mother-in-law’s face and how sad she looked and I remember her apologizing saying she should have known better. That’s really about all I remember about that visit. I know we stayed until Sunday. I think I went to church that day but can not be sure. I know we left Bryan and Michael down there for a week and came home with just Karen and Kim. Karl went back to school the next day. I remember that week feeding Karen and me lunch and feeding Kim then we would all go down for a nap, not waking until Karl got home from school around 4:00 pm. I later really felt for Karl because he was feeding Kim the two times between 10 pm and 6 am and then having to go to work then come home and take over here. I know I didn’t have any additional help other than him. The diapers Kim wore were cloth diapers using safety pins to close them. I was able to take care of him and Karen when Karl wasn’t there. I don’t remember how difficult it was. I’m sure it must have been challenging at times for me. I don’t think we even informed the bishop. We tho’t the doctor knew what he was talking about. And we figured I’d eventually get over it, given enough time. As I was talking to doctors later, two in particular, told me that it was a stroke I had had. That an allergy doesn’t act like that nor does it last that long. And when I was studying strokes in my nursing classes and as I took care of stroke patients I knew that that was what I had had also. I was also told that if and when I ever had a brain CT scan that it would show that I had had a stroke even tho’ it is many years later. Had I gone to the hospital 40 years ago, there was no CT scanner here to do one anyway. Altho’ as far as I can remember I was able to take care of my family less than a week after the stroke, it was months before I could speak spontaneously without thinking out every sentence before speaking and it took about six months for my hand writing to return to normal. I can remember it being about three weeks before I wrote to my parents. So I must not have had that much control until then. My mother said that my hand writing was quite illegible for six months. I do know that I had no medical intervention. It was thro’ the Priesthood and the tender mercies of the Lord that I had a full recovery over not so long a time….looking back on it. I’m sure that the first week or two especially was quite challenging but I can’t remember for sure. But over 40 years six months really isn’t that long. I told Jonathon Sunday night that if any good could come out of my stroke it was that my total recovery could give hope to others who have had a stroke. I also told him that I had no residual from it unless you could count when I get my tangue tongled. J All kidding aside. I am so grateful to the Lord granting the miracle of a full recovery so shortly after it happened. The other night Kim asked me about another episode. I told him that that was the only one meaning the only stroke. However, the next morning when I was still in the twilight zone before fully becoming awake, I knew that he was referring to when I had my rotator cuff repaired and had a laringial (sp?)spasm and went into respiratory arrest (quit breathing) and went very dark before I started breathing again. When they took another EKG after that it should I had had a heart attack and the x-ray of the lungs were completely white (they showed me.) they were going to put me in ICU but by the time the 2 ½ hours I was in the recovery room was up, they put me in IMC instead. (that’s were Jon is). The next morning (it was supposed to be a day surgery and I was supposed to have gone home that night) the EKG showed a right bundle branch block, no MI or heart attack, and the x-ray of my lungs were all black the way it was supposed to be. I still have the right bundle branch block (I just had an EKG last week) but Dr. Stutts told me that if I had to have a block that the RBB was the one to have. So there were two episodes that the I guess I could have been very comprimized but the Lord thro’ his priesthood has blessed me. That was the second thing I tho’t when I first woke up in recovery after the shoulder surgery, “It’s a good thing I had a blessing last night.” The first thing was, “I didn’t see the light.” J

I hope this helps you understand. I don’t think of it very often. Only when I need to tell someone to help them.